Going Dark

Two of my neighbors asked me if my electricity was out. "Yes", I said, "There are some big storms down south and maybe some lines are down." One of those neighbors is vision impaired.  She said her phone was just about out of battery. I looked at mine and saw that it was at 45%; probably enough to get through the day. I remembered that we had a portable lamp that has a phone charging port, so I connected my cellphone to that.  The batteries in the lamp were too low to charge the phone.

I got dressed and took the dog for a walk. I noticed then that the traffic light two blocks up the street was working  -- a good sign that the power outage was local.  Just to be on the safe side I drove to the nearby grocery store to get the six new batteries that the lantern/charger would need.

I was pleased to find that the lights were on in the store, but the batteries were behind the service counter where a sign said that the service counter was temporarily closed.  No problem; I walked through the swinging gate and took three packs of C batteries off the shelf.  I was immediately confronted by two store staff informing me that the area was out of bounds for customers.  "Yes, I know", I said, and walked to the auto-teller to check out.  I scanned the batteries' bar code -- $25 for six C batteries! 

While I waited for the phone to charge I wondered about how power outages affect people with disabilities or the homeless.  Then, I got to thinking about the thousands of people in New Mexico who faced catastrophic displacement just a couple months ago because of wildfires, and who are now experiencing massive flooding in the burn scar areas due to summer monsoon rains of unusual intensity. It is all a good reminder about how dependent all of us are on massive, complicated and vulnerable infrastructures, and how unready we are for what is coming.